Doug Fisher spent 35 years in the corporate world and more than a decade in academia, including time as director of the Marquette Center for Supply Chain Management. Upon his recent retirement, he talked with BizTimes reporter Arthur Thomas about his time watching southeastern Wisconsin industry. He plans to stay in the region as he turns to his next chapter.
What differences do you see between academia and the business world?
“One of the differences that comes to mind is in the corporate world, while you get an opportunity to develop people, you don’t have the opportunity to get 80 to 100 new ones every semester and have a chance to impact their lives on such a continuing basis. That was an absolute thrill; the kids are wonderful. From a business model point of view … there is a subtle similarity that I kind of challenged people to be aware of for the past decade or so: both entities or institutions have to generate a revenue stream. Their expenses for both cannot exceed revenues over time, and when either entity runs out of cash, it’s over. In the corporate world, that alignment … is very clear, but in academia that sense of awareness doesn’t seem to exist.
“… I don’t think we need to blow up the thing but it probably needs to explore some alternatives aggressively. This is not just Marquette; this is higher ed everywhere. To me, it’s still a fascinating place, I had an absolutely incredible time. It was a wonderful opportunity to impact a lot of students, and hopefully I didn’t mess up too many.”
What are your takeaways from watching the southeastern Wisconsin supply chain?
“While I anticipated the joy of working with students, one of the things I didn’t even anticipate was the opportunity to meet so many real-world professionals in my decade I was here. There’s something about putting professor after your name that the door is open and they just love to talk.
“I don’t think I’ve seen a better time to be going into the business world and selfishly, more specifically, to be in supply chain management; there’s just an awful lot of change and opportunity.
“We have this legacy and heritage, we know how to get things done, we have this amazing catalyst of Foxconn and politically, I wish we’d quit arguing over it … five years, even 10 years is not very long and what this area could look like in five to 10 years is absolutely incredible, but we’re going to need to earn it and in that regard, talent is going to be the critical resource. That’s the same call I got for 10 years.”
Are there a few specific things the region needs to do?
“I wish I had the pill I could take to answer that and cure all ills…I think I heard a note somewhere that all jobs, not just tech jobs, will have a high degree of tech competency required. I think we could probably beef up our ability to take liberal arts and infuse tech, take math and infuse tech. They don’t have to be data scientists or electrical engineers, but get (people) more familiar with the ability to use technology.”
What are your retirement plans?
“It’s nice not to be the point of the spear on a daily basis, I’ll grant that, but I still enjoy moving the needle in some way. I think one of the possible paths … is to kind of help the small to medium-sized companies come to grips with where this puck is going; whether that’s advisory or board, I don’t know. I’m not presumptuous enough to think that anybody would want me. There’s some discussion out there.”
Doug Fisher
Retired assistant professor, director
Marquette University Center for Supply Chain Management
1225 W. Wisconsin Ave., Milwaukee
